Sunday, 27 June 2021 ~ Extension of Full Lockdown

So my hunch was spot on. The full lockdown is extended, as announced by our PM today 😥.   The full lockdown can only be lifted on condition that the number of Covid cases dip to 4,000 and below and 10% of the population is fully vaccinated.  As of today, our country recorded 5,586 cases.  I am writing this down in my blog because I wish that a year from now, the world will be free from this dreadful pandemic; and when I read this post a year on, I will remember how my sentiments were at the height of the pandemic and cherish our post-Covid days even more.  

Everyday throughout the lockdown, I wake up hoping for a better day but the new day is no better than the previous one and sometimes the new day is worse than the previous few. There doesn't seem to be any improvement in the Covid situation in our country. Hubby's catering business has been hit hard and will continue to be affected until and unless social gatherings are allowed again. Will it ever be allowed? Yes the PM stated that all social and economic sectors will be reopened in the final phase of the recovery plan. This will only happen when the country records zero to single digit cases. That seems very far fetched now, with the emergence of new variants of viruses, anti-vaxxers and stubborn people who refuse to follow SOPs.  This war that we're in now has caused tremendous hardship to many people. More businesses will be shuttered in the days and weeks to come during this full lockdown. Many times, I feel like there's no light at the end of the tunnel. The past 1.5 years feels like a nightmare that wouldn't end.

I have a long list of things to ask from God everyday - good health for me and my loved ones, for hubby's catering business to be able to hang on and not shutter, for his business to be able to recover and rebound fully one day, for my daughters to study hard though it's hard for them to feel motivated after 1.5 years of online learning and for this pandemic to be brought under control so that our lives can return to at least 90% normal soon.

If you're feeling tired of having to cook 3 meals every single day, don't beat yourself up. Do give Catermate a try. They serve halal food (Malay, Indonesian, Western and Chinese) and deliver throughout the Klang Valley. 

I'm already feeling the brunt of having to clean up the kitchen 3x a day since the start of the MCO last year and it's worse now as Maria our part-time helper has stopped coming to our house temporarily until the Covid situation improves. We're ordering food at least three times a week and I just don't care anymore if the food is less than healthy. My sanity comes first 😐

Lamb shank curry from Catermate. I dunked sourdough bread and sourdough pancakes into the thick curry sauce and had it for dinner yesterday. 

Gyuniku/beef Curry and Tori Katsu that I ordered from a home-based seller in our Taman last week. The seller and I now support each other - I order her food and she orders from hubby's shop 😁

Wednesday, 23 June 2021 ~ Random Updates

The first half of 2021 is almost coming to an end and we've spent the last 6 months being stuck at home.  Cass and Sherilyn went back to school in April but school session was short-lived. Two weeks later schools were ordered closed again as the number of Covid cases spiked uncontrollably in almost all the schools. By this weekend, we will know whether the full lockdown will be extended or lifted.  Again, I just have the hunch that the full lockdown will be extended as the number of cases are still very high, hovering at above 5k today.  

I miss having my Sunday morning walk to the shops with Cass to buy food and stuff.  She keeps asking me when she can follow me to the shops again. She's really feeling the brunt of the home quarantine and is now experiencing zoom fatigue with over a year of online learning. She misses going to school to interact with friends and teachers. She tells me that she learns better in a classroom vs online.  It's too distractive and tempting to stray from the GC to other sites like You Tube and Discord.  I'm sure many parents can relate to this, eh? 😐

We're very thankful that Haru came into our lives. She's created such immense joy and laughter to the girls  and me amidst the depressing lockdown. 

From having Ailurophobia to now catsitting Haru, Alycia has come a long way in just 4 months.

We're still having Hainanese chicken chop and Western chicken chop from hubby's shop several times a week. But the girls have no complaints. As long as they don't have to wash so many dirty dishes and clean a greasy kitchen, we're all happy to be eating the same food 😁

We had Thai food delivered to us yesterday as I was craving for tomyam and green curry! We all enjoyed our dinner.

Simplest Way To Eat A Watermelon

Alycia loves watermelon; however she dislikes cutting up one. I used to be the one peeling and slicing watermelon, including cutting off the skin for everyone to savor this juicy fruit conveniently like kings and queens.  Ever since Maria stopped coming to help us in the evenings, I have lesser time on hand for doing such things. So I delegated the task of cutting melons (watermelon, rock melon, honeydew) to Alycia. She bemoans doing this tedious task most of the time. She bemoans each time she's asked to do any chore but she'll still do it. But which mother likes to hear complaints, eh? 😒 She's just not cut to be in the kitchen but I'm trying to train her to be adept in the kitchen to save herself in future.

Recently, Alycia discovered a really quick and mess-free way of serving watermelon to everyone. She uses an ice-cream scoop to scrape the melon flesh into balls. And after she's done with scooping up the melon balls (which actually don't look like balls but a Tupperware of red mess in odd shapes and sizes! 😖), she uses a stainless steel straw to savor the watermelon juice. 

This is Alycia's life's simplest pleasure. She's having a time of her life now doing nothing at home and she's got another 2.5 months to lollygag at home before she goes to college in early September.

Another simple pleasure for this girl - shopping at the biscuit and snacks shop with me. Like a little girl in a toy shop, she told me that the biscuit shop is her wonderland 😆 and I ended up spending over RM30 just on biscuits and snacks today.

Friday, 11 June 2021

I was at hubby's central kitchen to help him with the photography for the past two days. I was donning on my face mask and suffocating, with bullets of sweat dripping down my face while coughing in his kitchen. The culprit was this super duper huge commercial wok filled with dried chilies boiling. And also a huge industrial oven in use at the same time.  Can you imagine how suffocating and choking it is to inhale the hot and spicy smoke in the hot kitchen that feels like a sauna everyday? 

This is how much dried chilies are used to cook one batch of sambal and this is done several times a week. Everyone in the kitchen including hubs has to bear with the chilies, onions and spices bubbling in the wok, inhaling the tear-jerking yet aromatic smoke emitting from the wok, while donning on face masks.  I couldn't wait to run out of his kitchen and back into my car to remove my mask to breathe in some cool air from the air-cond 😅😷   

Sambal for Catermate's best seller Nasi Lemak is made from scratch.

The compensation for helping him with the photography is of course food.  I almost never leave his kitchen empty handed.  For the past two days, we had kuih (which is my ultimate kryptonite) which we will never get enough of and fried chicken, which is everyone's favorite!

We've been having Western chicken chop and Hainanese chicken chop from hubby's kitchen almost everyday the entire week last week till we want to take a break from chicken for a week now 😂

Random Updates ~ 7 June 2021

Alycia received her 2nd pay check last week. Though it's only a small amount as she worked for only  two weeks at the international pre-school last month, she was nonetheless still very thankful and happy.   Yesterday she treated her sisters and me to milk tea from Tealive, delivered to us via Grab.  After receiving her first pay check last month, Alycia gave me RM100 and bought cakes  to treat everyone at home.

With the pandemic at its peak now, Alycia will not be looking for another temporary job anytime soon. She has 3 more months before she goes to college and life for her now is really relaxed and stress-free.  Lights are only turned off way past 1am and she gets up some 10-12 hours later, after which she lollygags at home waiting for all her meals!!  Oh how I miss those carefree, stress-free easy life without any commitment. I wonder if I will ever get to live like this again? 😜

I am missing our pre-Covid19 days very very much. The weekly mall shopping, the monthly shopping for clothes or shoes, the weekly splurges at cafes and restaurants, the daily coffee shop and kopitiam brunch sessions with hubs, Sunday church, gatherings with friends, reunion with my family members and siblings in Ipoh, traveling and much more. Gawd, I'm missing Ipoh so much.  Again I'm wondering when we can ever do this again 😓 

This is our Sunday dinner yesterday -- Hainanese chicken chop from hubby's central kitchen, Catermate.  

Chicken chop and Nasi Lemak will likely be our lunch tomorrow as there's a bulk order for chicken chop and Nasi Lemak tomorrow for a customer's Zoom Meeting lunch with all her staff.  

Though we've all been eating the same kind of dishes from hubby's shop almost daily throughout the MCO for the last 1.5 years, I have no complaints. As long as we don't have to cook at home and clean up a greasy kitchen and floor, everyone is happy. The girl who's on dirty dishes duty will be the happiest too 😁. Win win for everyone.  

Lifting Your Assets - Your Butt!

Have you ever noticed that old folks have flat buttocks?  If you're in your late 50s,  you may start to notice that your butt is getting flabby and flat.  Losing your butt to shrinking butt muscles with age is a real thing.  As the muscles atrophy, their tendons end up getting frayed and torn. Thus,  older people have flat butts with more tendon tears in their gluteal muscles.

Worry not. There are several ways to prevent or delay those muscles from sagging and atrophying.  There are plenty of butt exercises that you can find from the internet to help you achieve super toned glute muscles. Some women take butt enhancing pills, go on a diet or resort to implants or surgery.  When it comes to giving your rear an instant lift, there's a solution that's effective that you don't have to worry about its side effects. It's something that's worth investing in -- butt lifter or bum bra!

Butt Lifters are specialized shapewear garments designed to raise and firm your buttocks. As our body ages we lose the natural elasticity in our skin and begin to lose important muscle tone. Butt Lifters help the butt keep its original form and helps the muscles and skin retain its strength.  Butt Lifters worn under your wardrobe leave your bottoms and dresses fitting you the way you want it to.  With a good butt lifter along with a booty boot camp (with some floor exercises targeting the gluteal muscles), a healthy diet and a neoprene waist trainer, achieving an  hourglass bod may be a reality for you. Try it to see if it works!

Butt lifters are a popular trend right now, especially amongst celebrities. That's the reason why you hardly ever see muffin tops, tummy pooches or back fat issues on celebrities at red carpet events. This is Hollywood's little sexy secret - shapewear!

1st Dose AstraZeneca Shot Side Effects

After the 1st dose of AstraZeneca shot on 2 June, the first side effect that I experienced within half an hour after getting the shot was a mild sore on the injection site.  Several hours later the sore on the arm intensified and my mouth tasted bitter the entire night.

The next morning I was still feeling alright except for the sore on the injection site.  My arm felt like I had lifted a 10kg dumb bell the previous day and felt raw when touched. At around 10-ish in the morning, the headache started to kick in.  I skipped jogging that day, as well as the next day.  As the hours passed, more side effects kicked in.  I felt aches on my neck and shoulder blades. I felt lethargic, sleepy and malaise but there was no fever and chills.  The feeling I felt was similar to how I'd feel whenever I don't get enough sleep or am about to get a flu. I continued with house chores and settled some customers' orders.  

When you're a WFHM, work continues whether you're sick, have a bad headache, didn't sleep well the previous night or recuperating from a surgery or fall.  Several years ago, I fell on the road while jogging and injured both my palms so badly that I could see raw flesh!  I had to bandage both my hands followed with cling wrapping them. Cass was still a toddler and I still had to wash her butt with a heavily bandaged hand.  

I took 3 naps that day and downed a packet of Izumio. By late evening, I felt slightly better.  The next morning (today), the side effects were all gone and I am right as rain again, thank God! 

As for the mil, she had zero side effects! Not even a sore arm. She's so lucky!

I'm not going to let my guard down yet.  The side effects may only kick in later but I'm praying that I'll be fine. It bothers me each time I read news of people who died of complications from the AZ shot.  The latest death is that of a 39-year old British model who died 13 days after receiving her AZ vaccine in Cyprus.   On the 8th day after receiving the vaccine, she woke up feeling fine and then within an hour she had full body shakes, all her joints seized and she was struggling to breathe and was cold to the bone with a persistent headache and dizziness!  RIP Stephanie.

Have you taken your Covid vaccine yet? If you have, did you experience any side effects? Would love to hear from you! 😊